With Altered Nature, we bring together two distinctive positions of urban art, ARDIF and Pixelpancho, in a single exhibition. Nature is approached not as a representation, but as a mutable, dynamic state. Both artists emerged from the street and urban art scene, where organic forms, technical aesthetics and urban influences merge in a singular way.The Idea of Nature At the heart of the exhibition lies the idea of a nature that can no longer be conceived as untouched or idealised, but is shaped by human intervention, technological processes and cultural transformation.A Hybrid System In the works of ARDIF and Pixelpancho, nature appears as a hybrid system, at once organic and constructed. While ARDIF's imagery often reveals biomechanical structures in which plants and machines merge into one another, Pixelpancho develops complex scenarios between nature, architecture and mechanical elements. Structures seem both grown and built; surfaces bear traces of time, memory, damage and repair.Growth and Decay The result is a body of imagery that shows less landscape in the classical sense than processes made visible: growth and decay, layering and fragmentation, mechanics and abstraction.The title Altered Nature is deliberately left open. "Altered" refers both to physical change and to a shift in perception: a nature filtered through technology, urban space and imagination.The exhibition is not intended as a clear statement, but as an atmospheric space in which different states of an altered nature meet and form new connections. ALTERED NATURE ARDIF x PIXELPANCHO 30.5. – 17.7. Vernissage : 30.5. 19-22h

Even the ancient Greeks consulted oracles when they faced important decisions or when changes in life lay ahead. Back then, priestesses had to be put into a trance, and the oracle was open only to members of high society. Its pronouncements could be interpreted in many ways and invited reflection. The consultation of oracles can be found in every culture and continues to this day.The TarotThe tarot first appeared as a card game in 15th-century Italy. From the 18th century onwards, particularly in France, it came to be used for fortune-telling as well as for psychological and esoteric purposes. To this day, it remains hugely popular and is used to reflect on one's personal situation or on decisions that lie ahead. In times that could hardly be more complex, and that confront us with changes in the reality of our lives, many wish for a mystical sign that might help them readjust their view of the future.ARDIF's Interpretation of the ArcanaThe French urban artist ARDIF has explored the theme of the oracle and developed a tarot entirely his own. He has translated the 22 Major Arcana into his unmistakable illustrative language, creating the "Oracle of Mechanimals". ARDIF's work is distinguished by its conceptual strength and his talent as a draughtsman, which comes impressively to the fore in his richly detailed illustrations. His works delight art lovers and collectors around the world. The 22 drawings of the "Oracle of Mechanimals" are on view at Galerie Pretty Portal from 26 April.ARDIF – "Oracle of Mechanimals"Exhibition: 26 April – 31 May 2024Opening: Friday, 26 April 2024, 7 pmPretty Portal Brunnenstraße 12 40223 Düsseldorf

Where people once quickened their pace, they now stop and look. Since August 2022, Düsseldorf has had a new cultural highlight: Pretty Wall Bilk. In the underpass of Bilk S-Bahn station, ten urban artists present their work. An inhospitable place that everyone tried to pass through as quickly as possible has become a gallery in public space.A Gallery in PassingThe new open-air museum showcases a broad spectrum of contemporary urban positions: figurative alongside abstract works, ranging from graffiti and street art to urban art and Graffuturism. Today, passers-by stop on their way to work or to the shops and take a moment to enjoy the art.Five Years to the First BrushstrokeWe first had the idea for a gallery in the underpass back in 2017. But good things take time, and it took another five years before it could be realised. Bureaucratic hurdles, permits to paint the walls and pillars, the search for funding and many other less exciting tasks all had to be tackled before the project could finally get underway in 2022. Even before the first brushstroke touched the wall, the project idea was honoured with the Urbanana Award from Tourismus NRW.Finding the artists was quick. Alexis "Bust" Stephens, ARDIF, Demon, L.E.T., Marc C. Woehr, Roman Klonek, Oliver "MAGIC" Räke, SKIO, Théo Lopez and Top Notch contributed their artistic ideas, brought them to the walls and turned Pretty Wall Bilk into reality.From the Wall to the GalleryFor THE PRETTY WALL SHOW, we invited all the artists involved in the project to show their latest studio works. Like the works in the underpass, the selection in the gallery offers an excellent overview of the breadth of contemporary urban art. On show are paintings, mixed-media installations and drawings."THE PRETTY WALL SHOW"Exhibition 14 October – 25 November 2022Opening Friday, 14 October 2022, 7 pmPretty Portal Brunnenstraße 12 40223 Düsseldorf

Since time immemorial, fabulous creatures have been beings whose appearance springs from the human imagination. And yet many of them have their origins in the real world and are shaped by the history of their time. In a mystical way, they carry humanity's ancient stories within them and pass them on.Modern Fabulous CreaturesARDIF's new series of works features modern fabulous creatures: cyborgs, hybrids of biological organism and a machina obscura, a surreal symbiosis of medieval architecture and ancient mechanics. The mechanical part, whose wealth of detail captivates the viewer's eye, romanticises the composition's initially rather dystopian impression.ARDIF's creatures, too, are children of their time. The French urban artist powerfully reflects on the increasingly unbalanced relationship between humans and nature, which in the short term poses a threat to our planet, but in the long term above all to our own species. His works also mirror the ever-advancing mechanisation of our everyday lives, digitalisation and the age of machines that looms like a spectre.The Realm of Ancient MechanimalsIn Realm of Ancient Mechanimals, ARDIF takes up humanity's ancient stories and adds a further narrative layer to his fabulous creatures. His creations originate in the myths and folklore of a wide range of cultures. His realm of ancient mechanimals includes the Japanese kitsune, a masked fox with many tails regarded as a bringer of good fortune; the Greek Pegasus, the winged horse that stands for wisdom and poetry; and the jackalope, a hybrid of hare and pronghorn that is hugely popular in North America.ARDIF & FriendsTo explore the theme even further, ARDIF invited four artist friends into dialogue: Dzia, Horor, Parvati and Sandrot. The result is a series of collaborations in which ARDIF's fusion of nature and technology is expanded by his guests' own artistic perspectives.DziaBelgian painter Dzia breaks down the animals he paints into a kind of mosaic of geometric free forms that follows the contours of the animal's shape. His unmistakable line can be found in countless murals around the world, with recent projects taking him to China, Norway and Spain. Dzia holds a master's degree in fine arts from the Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp. For his contribution to the exhibition, he chose a winged cat from North African mythology.HororHoror found his way to art in the early 2000s as a graffiti writer. After completing his fine arts studies at the Sorbonne, he did not forget his roots but developed a mix of typography and painting. His visual language skilfully combines influences from the streets of the Paris suburbs with a classical repertoire he discovered during his studies. His works show influences of sensual Surrealism, contemporary illustration and naturalistic drawing. They are characterised by calligraphically inspired line work that flows through his creations in rhythmic waves.ParvatiThe hybrid figures of French-Indian artist Parvati are half human, half bird. They open the door to a poetic dream that questions the relationship between the bizarre and the beautiful, as well as the boundary between human and animal. Alongside fauna, flora is omnipresent in her works, an echo of the Amazonian forests of French Guiana, where she was born and raised. Inspired by the great masters of the Renaissance, she paints her figures exclusively in oil, while her backgrounds also feature acrylic and spray paint. For her interventions in public space, she, like ARDIF, often uses paste-ups: life-size anthropomorphic birds prepared in the studio, which she then pastes up in the streets.SandrotFrench artist Sandrot combines Pop Art with urban art in her painting. She has a penchant for large formats and is known for her expressive murals. With her paintings, she aims to raise awareness of the importance of wildlife and environmental protection. She explores the nature of animals, focusing on their character and portraying them as beings with a soul. For the exhibition, she and ARDIF jointly created an African elephant, a symbol of wisdom, power and dignity on its continent."Realm of Ancient Mechanimals" ARDIF & Friends (Dzia, Horor, Parvati, Sandrot)Exhibition 30 April – 25 June 2021 Tuesday – Friday, 2 – 7 pmPretty Portal Brunnenstraße 12 40223 Düsseldorf

Nature provides the ideas; humans merely plagiarise. From aircraft wings to Velcro to robotic arms, engineers and designers have always drawn their ideas from nature and replicated them. This principle is known as biomimicry. Yet these replicas remain limited copies that cannot match the precision, complexity and performance of the originals.Nature and MachineIn his solo exhibition MACHINaturE vs MachiNATURE, French artist ARDIF juxtaposes nature and machine. His works show how humans copy nature with their creations, while making clear how far these copies fall short of the original.Progress and ResponsibilityARDIF also addresses the threat that humans pose to nature and the question of how technological progress and respect for the environment can be brought into balance.From Fauna to FloraAfter focusing exclusively on compositions from the animal kingdom in recent years, ARDIF now brings the plant world into his work as well. Visitors can look forward to new drawings, illustrations and installations.About the ArtistARDIF explores the mechanics behind living matter. In his drawings, he mostly transforms animals into mechanical creatures that are split in two: one half is rendered naturalistically, while the other turns into a curious machine of intricate architecture. This juxtaposition creates a particular tension and invites close inspection.ARDIF enlarges his drawings and brings them to the streets as paste-ups. In Paris, his half-mechanical animals have become an integral part of the cityscape. In Düsseldorf, too, ARDIF left his mark last September with a series of interventions in public space. "MACHINaturE vs MachiNATURE" ARDIFOpening Friday, 22 March 2019, 7 – 10 pmExhibition 25 March – 26 April 2019 Monday – Friday, 11 am – 7 pm and by appointmentPretty Portal Brunnenstraße 12 40223 Düsseldorf

It all begins with a drawing. A pencil, a little ink, a piece of charcoal or a marker are all it takes to bring entire worlds to life: worlds full of mechanical animals, battered robots and people whose emotions are revealed in just a few strokes.Three Draughtsmen, Three WorldsFor our last exhibition of the year, we are devoting ourselves entirely to drawing. On show are works in pencil, ink, charcoal and marker by Guy Denning and Pixelpancho, two internationally renowned artists, and by ARDIF, a young French artist who is attracting more and more attention, especially in Paris.ARDIFARDIF is a young French artist who explores the mechanics behind living matter. In his drawings, he mostly transforms animals into mechanical creatures that are split in two: one half is rendered naturalistically, while the other turns into a curious machine of intricate architecture. This juxtaposition creates a particular tension and invites close inspection. ARDIF enlarges his drawings and brings them to the streets as paste-ups. In Paris, his half-mechanical animals have become an integral part of the cityscape.Guy DenningGuy Denning was born in North Somerset in 1965. He has been obsessed with visual art since childhood and started painting in oils at the age of eleven, after receiving a set of old paints from a relative who had grown bored with them. Throughout the 1980s, his applications to study painting at degree level were repeatedly unsuccessful, but he continued painting while studying art history with the Open University and learning painting technique from older painters he knew in the West of England. From 1992, he exhibited across Britain, and since 2007 he has also exhibited in the United States, Germany, Italy and France. His paintings have been shown in numerous solo and group exhibitions. His work is held in several public collections, including the Politics Department of the University of Bristol, the Political Science Department of the University of Galway and the MAGI'900 Museum of Contemporary Art in Bologna.Guy Denning's work combines a traditional painterly style with a contemporary, punk-inspired twist of embedded collaged and stencilled text. This aesthetic, blended with a political narrative, has earned Denning a loyal following among collectors of urban art.PixelpanchoPixelpancho has a special bond with robots: they are the ever-recurring theme of his work."I am driven by a forgotten world, hidden beneath a thick layer of dust and dirt. There are robots there, creations of humankind, battered and worn, a symbiosis of the organic and the inorganic, their bodies of rusty iron falling apart. Full of dreams, desires and hopes." (translated)In his surreal visual world, humans, puppets and robots merge into images alluding to major commercial brands, superheroes and famous pop icons, all of them subject to constant change and threatened by decay. Pixelpancho convinces not only through his striking motifs, but also through his unique style, which draws on many and varied sources.Born in Italy, he studied at the Accademia Albertina di Belle Arti in Turin and at the Academy of Fine Arts in Valencia. On his many travels, he never missed an opportunity to take part in festivals and show his work in exhibitions. Pixelpancho is regarded as one of the new big names of the Italian urban art scene, which gradually developed around artists such as Blu and Ericailcane, the Fame Festival and Studio Chromie."Punks, Robots & Angels" ARDIF · Guy Denning · PixelpanchoOpening Thursday, 7 December 2017 Please note: this time, the opening takes place on a Thursday.Exhibition 8 December 2017 – 26 January 2018 Monday – Friday, 11 am – 7 pm and by appointmentPretty Portal Brunnenstraße 12 40223 Düsseldorf